So, 24 hours have gone by since the big Open Space announcement by LL. I’ve seen ranting, protests, hundreds of blog posts addressing it and the chat log from the emergency meeting with Jack Linden. I’ve no idea what’s going to happen.
Will LL revise their plan? I’d like to think so. The residents of SL are the backbone of their product. Without us, SL ceases to exist. So if they’ve listened at all they’ll rethink their plan on the OpenSpace sims.
If LL doesn’t revise their plan, then what. Well, I’ve heard people saying they are dumping all their OpenSpaces. I’ve heard some land owners and content creators threaten to leave SL entirely. Well that’s a bit silly if you ask me. Dumping the OS’ sure, leaving SL completely, no. If you love the place then you’ll find a way to work with what we have.
I’ve done some more thinking, read many blogs about it and I’ve got some thoughts on the whole thing. If you want to read some of the recap and find the other blog links, go over to Vint’s blog. She’s organized them quite nicely. Crap also has a flickr group dedicated to the Open Spaces that may be lost forever.
So here are my rambling thoughts on the whole thing..
1. Estate owners have been bitching about not having their sims entirely rented out. The lowering of the price and increase in prims on the Open Spaces is a direct result of this IMO. If you could have an entire island to yourself for the same price as a 1/4 of a normal island what would you do? Just look at how many OpenSpaces there are now and how many empty plots there are on the islands. I won’t even go into mainland because I’m not familiar enough with it to comment.
2. Open Space sims had their prims increased and the prices lowered. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out what’s gonna happen. And look! It happened! For the most part, I imagine the majority of people have not abused them. Some people have though. Too many avs, too many scripts, too many textures etc etc. I think the abusers should be paying more for their over use of the system resources.
3. Offer more options. Instead of offering only 2 types of sims, offer 4. Main sim as it is today. Void sim that is truly open space and strictly limited to # of avatars, script usage and prim count. All of which being very low. I’d add two *light* sims. One with 1700 prims and one with 3750. Then price them accordingly. It’s a service contract, you pay for the service you want. I’m sure LL has the ability to do this now too. This seems to be a better model which will not punish anyone for staying in the boundaries and will get those who wish to push the limits to pay for the privilege. Now put all the heavy users together on their own servers which they are paying a premium to have. Does this make sense to anyone besides me?
4. In the 2 years I’ve been in SL, i’ve seen residents up in arms over a number of topics. SL5B, lowering of island prices, ad farms etc etc. Never have I seen such an outcry against LL as I’ve seen the last 24 hours. It’s good to see so many residents standing up for what they believe in. Just remember, in order for a protest to work, you need your apponent to listen to you and agree with you. This isn’t going to happen without rational ideas and suggestions. As a professor of mine used to say, "Do not complain to me unless you have a suggestion for a solution." Simply complaining does nothing. Give LL suggestions that make sense for everyone.
5. At the end of the day LL will do what they want. It’s their world. Those of us committed to SL will figure out a way to survive. If content creators/designers/land owners leave, that will simply open a door for some smart cookie to take their place. Life is about change. Stand still and you’ll get run over.
Jack Linden said in the chat of the emergency meeting yesterday that LL may change the plans for the Open Spaces. I look forward to seeing that. I think the future is going to be an interesting place. I’ll be in SL watching it from a strip of beach on Angel Square.